1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a rinsing method of rinsing a substrate, such as a semiconductor wafer, carrying thereon an exposed pattern processed by a developing process by a rinsing process, a developing method including such a rinsing process, a developing system capable of carrying out the developing method, and a computer-read storage medium storing control programs for controlling those methods.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a semiconductor device fabricating process, for example, a resist pattern as a mask for forming a predetermined pattern is formed on a surface of a semiconductor wafer (hereinafter referred to simply as “wafer”) by a photolithographic method including the steps of forming a resist film on the surface of the wafer by discharging a liquid resist onto the surface of the wafer, processing the resist film formed on the surface of the wafer by an exposure process to form a predetermined pattern in the resist film and developing the exposed pattern.
The developing process among those steps of the photolithographic method discharges a developer onto the wafer to form a developer puddle of the developer over the entire surface of the wafer, lets the developer circulate by natural convection to make the developing process progress, discharges a rinsing liquid, such as pure water, onto a central part of the wafer while the wafer is being rotated to rinse out the developer remaining on the wafer from the wafer, and rotates the wafer at a high rotating speed to dry the wafer by shaking the developer and the rinsing liquid off the wafer. Such a developing process is disclosed in, for example, JP-A 2001-057334 (Patent document 1).
The reduction of the thickness of lines forming circuit patterns, the miniaturization of circuit patterns and the increase of the number of components of semiconductor devices have made a rapid progress in recent years. Consequently, further improvement of exposure resolution has been desired. Studies have been made to develop exposure techniques using short-wavelength laser beams emitted by argon fluoride lasers (ArF lasers), krypton fluoride lasers (KrF lasers) and the like and immersion exposure techniques that fill up a space between a lens and a wafer with a liquid, such as pure water, and irradiates the wafer with light transmitted by the liquid filling up the space
Resists used by exposure techniques using ArF and KrF lasers and immersion exposure techniques have properties different from known resists and have a high hydrophobic property and it is difficult for the rinsing step of the conventional developing process to remove satisfactorily residuals remaining on the wafer after development, such as matters produced by dissolution. Unremoved residuals are converted into particles adhering to the wafer and those particles cause development defects.